It's not often a trailer really grabs us lately. After all, in the games industry, even the most incredible of explosions starts to lose its impact after a while. But the trailer for the recently revealed Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain sucked us in for a different reason. It was all about the story.
Well, sort of. Asking plenty more questions than it answers, The Phantom Pain's trailer, set to the tune of Garbage's 'Not Your Kind of People' painted a haunting picture of the upcoming stealth 'em up, without really touching on what the game will actually play like.
Taking place almost a decade after the events of the also upcoming Metal Gear Solid Ground Zeroes, the trailer opens with lead character Naked Snake (also known as Big Boss) awakening from a nine year coma to discover that not only has his left arm been amputated (which explains the 'phantom pain' title), but the 'entire world' is also seeking to put him into permanent retirement. Fleeing from the hospital, and getting used to the lack of his limb, Snake escapes and forms a new mercenary unit called 'Diamond Dogs', in order to track down those who are responsible for his current predicament.
Unfortunately, though, while the trailer certainly has us intrigued, we're all too aware of just how hard it usually is to get into Metal Gear Solid games if you aren't already a fan of the series. We should know - we tried for the Metal Gear Solid HD Collection, only to find MGS2 hampered by an awkward control scheme, bemusing plot, and a tutorial that takes place over three hours into the game, while MGS3 was only a tad more welcoming. Both were still enjoyable games, once you'd worked your way around them, but breaking the walls down wasn't an easy task. With an already interesting plot being teased for The Phantom Pain, we're just hopeful that Konami, and developers Kojima Productions will be taking steps to help ease newcomers in. With a second game, Metal Gear Solid: Ground Zeroes also on its way, effectively working as a 'prologue' title to The Phantom Pain, things could easily get even more confusing than before.
Both Ground Zeroes and The Phantom Pain will be arriving on Playstation 3 and Xbox 360, and Kojima has also hinted at The Phantom Pain could find it's way to PC. Neither game currently has a concrete release date, but you'll know as soon as we do. In the mean time, why not feast your eyes on the game's mysterious trailer:
